1. Field of the Invention.
This invention relates to automatically machining coiled stock, i.e. a thread-like material wound to form a spool.
2. Description of the Prior Art.
Stock, after having been unwound from the spool and possibly been passed between staggered rollers to straighten it, has, as yet, been fed to a fixed collet chuck by a stock pusher which, at the beginning of every machining cycle, pushes through the open collet chuck a sufficient length of stock to produce a workpiece. At the end of the feeding by the stock pusher, the collet chuck is closed again and machining a workpiece starts. The corresponding operations are carried out by means of a rotary disc mounted in front of the collet chuck and carrying on its face opposite the collet chuck tools movable in a radial direction.
If the workpieces to be manufactured have outer cylindrical surfaces with a diameter of one millimeter and less, it is no longer possible to let the tools of the known machines work at their cutting speed. The disc carrying the tools should, indeed, rotate at speeds incompatible with its inertia and the unbalanced masses due to the movable tools. At the admissible rotary speeds of said disc, the output, however, suffers although the coiled stock dispenses with the conventional loading of stock bars.